Body odor proposal smells like Chicago gold

September 03, 2009|By John Kass

Chicago politicians keep insisting they want to host the 2016 Olympic Games and all that comes with it.

But that would include a gazillion people from all over the world, crowding together in Chicago buses and trains, perspiring in great masses of Olympian humanity during the heat of the summer, while you're on a bus or train commuting to work.

It's already become a big issue in Honolulu. The vacation paradise's city council is doing something that's being called unconstitutional.

They're proposing a new law barring those with body odor from taking public transportation.

That's right. An Acrid Pits Prohibition.

"As we become more inundated with people from all over the world, their way of taking care of their health is different," Honolulu Councilman Rod Tam was quoted as saying in the Honolulu Advertiser about his Body Odor Bill.

Now I'm not saying that people born outside the U.S. have more body odor than native-born Americans, even Hawaiians. Don't even go there.

But Tam and council colleague, Nestor Garcia, say they're tired of fielding complaints from Hawaiians about the stinky pits of their fellow commuters.

"It is, as you know, very difficult to regulate human behavior," Garcia was quoted as saying. "But I thought it was a good idea to get the discussion going."

Naturally, the American Civil Liberties Union is threatening to get involved, arguing the law will be too vague.

To get the discussion going here -- or not -- we called public transportation officials in Illinois.

"No, we don't have such a rule and there is not one under consideration," said Noelle Gaffney, spokeswoman for the Chicago Transit Authority.

She offered statistics that show of more than 11,000 CTA rider complaints this year, only four have involved bad hygiene.

Maybe that's because commuters who've passed out from bad whiffs find it impossible to call the CTA while unconscious.

Metra spokesman Michael Gillis is a former Sun-Times reporter. Back in the day, Mike would have jumped at the chance to write about hordes of riders about to be excommunicated from trains and buses because of their acrid whiffs.

But Gillis said he was completely unaware of the proposed Hawaiian pit ban.

"Metra has no set policy, although we do hope people use good judgment when it comes to hygiene," he said.

Would it be unconstitutional? Isn't it an individual's right not to bathe or wear deodorant?

"You see complaints, but those are just the kinds of things you hope people use good judgment on," Gillis said.

Kevin O'Neil, who runs the CTA Tattler blog (chicagonow.com/blogs/cta-tattler) isn't sold on the body odor ban.

"I'm a little skeptical," he said, adding that he receives complaints about B.O., but just as many about men who wear too much heavy cologne.

I've heard other CTA horror stories in the past, including the guy who sucks on the ends of women's hair; the woman who flosses and shares her plaque with the entire bus whether they want some or not; the barbarians who quietly fill up the back of your hoodie with chicken bones from their dinner; and the skin peeler, whom I refuse to discuss, except to say that if you ride the CTA, never, ever touch the window. That's why I shy away from public transportation.

"There's the generic complaint of the homeless guy who stinks up a whole car," O'Neil said. "And people leave behind all kinds of personal belongings, fingernails, toenails, clumps of nose hair strewn about."

If anyone could identify a clump of nose hair strewn on a seat, they probably don't realize it must have came from a gigantic nose, a nose too large and aggressive (with sprongy, easily identifiable nose hairs) to contemplate while sober, and that it's time to get off that bus. Now.

An Illinois body odor ban would be a great way for politicians to squeeze cash from the manufacturers of soaps and deodorants. That's O'Neil's theory. And I concur.

"I'm sure some people would be all for it," he said.

"But it might be seen as discriminatory. Plus, how would you enforce it? Smell patrol? I don't know."

You might not be able to define it. But you'll know it when you smell it.

And I can't wait to see Old Spice and Axe fight it out to become the official deodorant of Chicago's 2016 Olympics.